Ex-New York Times Editor Writes On Getting Fired In Memoir

POSTED: 7:21 pm EDT April 13, 2006

UPDATED: 7:49 pm EDT April 13, 2006

NEW YORK -- Howell Raines, the former executive editor of The New York Times, warns at the beginning of his new memoir that the book is about sport fishing and the "unpredictability of luck," not the episode that led to his firing: the Jayson Blair scandal.

Blair was the young Times reporter revealed in 2003 to have fabricated or plagiarized parts of several articles. Raines lost his job over the incident, in part because the paper failed to heed early warnings about Blair's conduct.

The book, "The One that Got Away," also isn't about Raines' oversight of the Times during the run-up to the U.S. invasion of Iraq. A year after his departure, the paper said in an editors' note that it had been "taken in" by misinformation about weapons of mass destruction in Iraq and published several articles that should have been challenged by editors.

He also didn't dwell on his successes, including the seven Pulitzer prizes the Times won in 2001, his first year on the job.

Instead, "The One that Got Away" is a recounting of fishing adventures, childhood memories and ruminations on what it means to have the biggest fish you've ever caught get away from you.

Raines does deal with Blair near the end of the book, calling him a "gremlin," a "dwarf" and a liar.

He takes shots at colleagues, too, while explaining how he "fell out of love" with the Times.

Among other things, Raines suggested the paper's expose on the Blair scandal laid too much blame on senior editors.

"If I had been writing the story, I would have gone for an approach of layered complexity, placing our failure to catch Jayson into the context of the Times's long-standing editing and personnel practices," he wrote.

Raines also wrote of feeling betrayed by his staff -- something he suggested stemmed from an environment of infighting and turf battles.

Of one Times editor who criticized him in public but was friendly in private, Raines wrote, "What is it about this place that has given this good man the soul of a bushwhacker?"

"If I had been writing the story, I would have gone for an approach of layered complexity, placing our failure to catch Jayson into the context of the Times's long-standing editing and personnel practices," he wrote."

TOO precious for even Pinchloaf, Draines. That's why you're gone to lunch at the old fishing hole...

"Of one Times editor who criticized him in public but was friendly in private, Raines wrote, "What is it about this place that has given this good man the soul of a bushwhacker?"

Jill Abramson would laugh at you but she doesn't know how, Draines. Her face is frozen that way, don't you know...

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